Tuesday, May 29, 2012

[Update: Orren Whiddon, who organized the Age of Limits conference, has contributed some comments, which I have added below.]

I have spent the last few days at a conference organized by the Four Quarters Interfaith Sanctuary near Artemas, Pennsylvania. Titled “The Age of Limits,” it was well attended and promises to be one of a series of annual conferences to address the waning of the industrial age and the social adaptation it makes necessary. This conference was quite different from all the others I have attended.

First, the venue is a campground; a beautiful one, consisting of lush meadows surrounded by an equally lush but passable forest girded on three sides by a fast-flowing creek of cold, clean water. This sanctuary is dedicated to nature spirituality, and includes a very impressive stone circle and a multitude of little shrines, altars, charms and amulets hung on trees. (Also included is an assortment of cheerful hippies skinny-dipping in the creek.) Second, spirituality was prominently featured in the presentations: the question of spiritual and emotional adaptation to fast-changing, unsettled times was very much on the agenda. Third, the campground is owned by a church; one of undefined denomination, theological bent or specific set of beliefs, but a church nevertheless. Lastly, the campground is run by a monastery that is at the heart of this church; the monks and nuns do not wear habits, do not seem to have not taken any specific vows other than those of loyalty, poverty and obedience, but in substance not too different from, say, the Benedictine Order: work is seven days a week, there is a meeting at eight sharp every morning, all meals are prepared and eaten together, and, except for insignificant personal effects, all property is shared.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Here's some food for thought. If you've
been listening to the muffled and incoherent noises coming from the
G8 and the surrounding political chattersphere, it's starting to
sound like a prayer meeting: “In the name of Austerity, Stimulus
and Growth, Amen!” And if you look at the individual leaders, what
is there for them to do except pray?

Starting from the bottom, there is TheMan Who Wasn't There: the newly reinaugurated Russian president
Vladimir Putin. He didn't even show up, but sent his obedient deputy
Medvedev instead, who made positive noises about how wonderful the
meeting was. Putin is a lonely man: he's been seen in public with his
wife a total of twice over the last two years; his two daughters are
living incognito somewhere in Europe, there are mobs of people
outside chanting “Russia Without Putin!” over and over again, and
even the VIPs present at the inauguration seemed to be
half-concealing a message behind their idolatrous smiles: “Wish you
weren't here, Vova!”

This week I am busy preparing my three talks for the Age of Limits retreat at Four Quarters, which will, in due course, be posted here in full. In the meantime, please enjoy this podcast in which I discuss, among other things, the fact that collapse is the elephant in the room, and that the various specialists are the blind men debating whether it is like a snake or a tree or a wall or a stick or a rope...

Dmitry: Uh, this is really breaking up.

Announcer: Welcome From Alpha to Omega. (main title follows)

O'Brien: (1:15) Hello, and welcome to the fifth episode of From Alpha to Omega. Today is Saturday, the 18th of May, 2012, and I'm your host, Tom O'Brien. (1:29) After a brief sojourn into the world of mathematics, philosophy, and biology, this week we return to systemic risk and economic collapse.

I am delighted to welcome to the show the high priest himself of the church of the collapsitarians, and blogger extraordinaire, Dmitry Orlov. (1:50) We will chat about the root causes of the current crisis, and what to expect and prepare for over the coming years and decades—(1:58) but first the boring stuff.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

It was Andrew Lawrence, the inventor of
the skyscraper index, who pointed out that the building of the world’s
tallest buildings is a good proxy for dating the onset of major
economic downturns. His index has stood the test of time; the few times when it made an incorrect prediction can be adequately explained by exceptional circumstances,
such as the onset of world wars. It is now being put to the
test again, and we ignore its advice at our own peril.

“The ability of the index to predict
economic collapse is surprising. For example, the Panic of 1907 was
presaged by the building of the Singer Building (completed in 1908)
and the Metropolitan Life Building (completed in 1909). The skyscraper
index also accurately predicted the Great Depression with the
completion of 40 Wall Tower in 1929, the Chrysler Building in 1930,
and the Empire State Building in 1931.”

Tuesday, May 08, 2012

The official shale gas story goes something like
this: recent technological breakthroughs by US energy companies have
made it possible to tap an abundant but previously inaccessible
source of clean, environmentally friendly natural gas. This has
enabled the US to become the world leader in natural gas production,
overtaking Russia, and getting ready to end of Russia's gas monopoly in Europe. Moreover, this new shale gas is found in many parts of
the world, and will, in due course, enable the majority of the
world's countries to achieve independence from traditional gas
producers. Consequently, the ability of those countries with the
largest natural gas reserves—Russia and Iran—to control the market
for natural gas will be reduced, along with their
overall geopolitical influence.

If this were the case, then we should
expect the Kremlin, along with Gazprom, to be quaking in their boots. But are they?

Tuesday, May 01, 2012

Suppose you wanted to achieve some
significant political effect; say, prevent or stop an unjust war. You
could organize gigantic demonstrations, with hundreds of thousands of
people marching in the streets, shouting slogans and waving anti-war
banners. You could write angry editorials in newspapers and on blogs
denouncing the falseness of the casus belli. You could write and
phone and email your elected and unelected representatives, asking
them to put a stop to it, and they would respond that they will of
course try, and by the way could you please make a campaign
contribution? You could also seethe and steam and lose sleep and
appetite over the disgusting thing your country is about to do or is
already doing. Would that stop the war? Alas, no. How many people
protested the war in Iraq? And what did that achieve? Precisely
nothing.

You see, the slogan “speak truth to
power” has certain limitations. The trouble with this slogan is
that it ignores the fact that power will not listen and the fact that
the people already know the truth and even make jokes about it. Those
in power may appear to be persuaded or dissuaded, but only if it is
to their advantage to do so. They will also sometimes choose to
co-opt, and then quietly subvert, popular movements, in order to
legitimize themselves in the eyes of those who would otherwise oppose
them. But, in general, they cannot be shifted from pursuing a course
they see as advantageous by mere rhetoric from those outside their
ranks. Some weaker regimes may be sensitive to embarrassment,
provided the criticisms are voiced by high-profile individuals in
internationally recognized positions of authority, but these same
criticisms backfire when aimed at the stronger regimes, because they
make those who voice them themselves appear ridiculous, engaged in
something futile.